


Daughter's Locket

by OughtaKnowBetter



Category: The Unit
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2010-09-12
Updated: 2010-09-25
Packaged: 2017-10-11 16:38:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 15,266
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/114450
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OughtaKnowBetter/pseuds/OughtaKnowBetter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A piece of intelligence goes astray...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Extraction

Daughter's Locket  
By OughtaKnowBetter  
Disclaimer: we can all pretend, can't we?  
* * *  
"Lissy! Hurry up; you'll be late for school."

"Mom, I can't find my locket! It was here just yesterday when I was watching Serena for Mrs. Brown! I can't find it!"

"Then you'll have to go to school without it. You can look for it when you come home. After you do your homework," Tiffy Gerhardt added firmly.

Light brown hair was tossed scornfully over a teenage shoulder, with a look that only a teenager could use effectively. "I gotta find it, Mom! I told Angie that I'd show her, and she's like the coolest kid in school. If I don't bring it in, she'll think I was lying!" The last broke off in a wail.

"You've got sixty seconds to look for it." Tiffy gave in, but only just so much. "After that, you're outta here."

"But what if I can't find—"

"Then you'll have to explain to your friends that you mislaid it, and that in the future you're going to keep your room neat and clean so that this doesn't happen. Right?"

* * *

Molly Blane never liked this part of town. It wasn't as though it was really bad—this was, after all, a town with an army base squatting right on its borders and a commanding officer who wasn't above sending out a squad or two of M.P.s to assist the local police in performance of their duties, whether or not those duties included interactions with a few soldiers feeling their oats—but the buildings lining the roads had that run-down feel to them. The windows of the buildings were old, and it wasn't only faces peering out through the curtains that caused the fabric to sway. The breezes creeping through did their share, allowing heat to leach away and steal money through electric and heating bills. There were a few too many walls in need of painting, and bushes in need of trimming, and roofs with drooping shingles.

No, Molly always double-checked that the doors to her car were locked whenever she needed to pass this way. It was a shame, because the market with the best quality food and the best prices lay in this direction. It wasn't as if anything had ever happened to her. In fact, Molly couldn't recall any story that involved someone she knew. Every story began with the disclaimer, 'I heard it from so and so, who heard it from so and so, who—" and on and on. It could have been a mugging in the seventies that had generated a tale that refused to go away. Who knew?

Still, Molly didn't like this section of town, and she put pressure on the gas pedal just an infinitesimal bit more, eased the speedometer up another notch, and hurried.

Bang!

The car jolted forward, rammed from behind.

Molly couldn't help herself; she screeched in alarm. Her chest suddenly hurt, and she realized that she'd been thrown against the steering wheel. I'll have a bruise there the size of a melon, was her first barely coherent thought.

Her second thought was: don't get out! That was the way some muggers worked: ram a car from behind, then rob whoever got out to see what the damage was. The engine to her car was still running; Molly could step on the pedal and not stop until she reached the police station or the army base, whichever direction she could remember most clearly. Panic clutched at her heart.

But the person emerging from the other car was just a young woman, someone just as dismayed as Molly that this had happened. Teenager, really, probably someone's daughter with her first car, talking on her cell phone, hurrying to school, terrified out of her wits. Molly remembered her daughter Betsy's first accident, not more than a dent in a fender but scared stiff that Sergeant Major Dad was going to come down on her like a ton of bricks. He hadn't, but only because Molly had persuaded him not to. Betsy had learned her lesson, had paid for the damage to the other car herself, and the only lingering damage was to a young girl's ego. Pounding it in hadn't been necessary.

This girl was likely in the same condition. How would the kid handle it? Mature, own up to her mistake and take responsibility? Or would she try to somehow make it into Molly's fault? Molly would take her cue from the child's own response. Molly pulled on the car handle, grateful that it opened without any difficulty, fumbling in her handbag for her license and registration—and her insurance card.

Two men from out of nowhere yanked her from the car and grabbed her handbag. One snatched at the heavy gold necklace that she wore, jerking at it until the clasp broke and the chain came away in his hand. Molly shrieked in rage, striking out at them, but they were gone in an instant, fleeing down the road and into a back alley.

Molly turned to the girl, to the other driver—had they assaulted her, too?

The second engine revved. The girl was back behind the wheel, pulling out and driving off in a squeal of rubber.

Gone. Everyone gone. Her handbag, her necklace, her sense of safety. Her clothing torn—must have happened when those men were snatching her purse. Molly started to reach for her cell phone to call the police—dammit, her cell had been in her purse! She didn't have any way to call for help. Even the few coins rattling around in the car wouldn't help; there weren't any pay phones any more, not with everyone owning one and two cells and sometimes more.

Dammit!

* * *

Sergeant Major Jonas Blane kept his voice low. "Snake Doc to home base. We have eyes on target. Repeat: eyes on the target."

Sgt. Kayla Medawar's cool tones came across the air waves, and Blane knew that she was receiving direction from Col. Ryan. "You have a go. Retrieve the package, Snake Doc."

Time for caution. Time to not make a mistake. His men were burning to go bust down the doors, pour in and stop the evil that was taking place. Blane knew that, but this was the time when caution was most needed. Allowing the screams of agony that were bursting from within to rush his team into a mistake would mean disaster for more than just their fellow soldier inside the shanty.

Blane forced himself to review the target. Team Beta was over the next hill, waiting for Alpha Team to give the go-ahead to come in with guns blazing and take out the target. The building that was a mere hundred yards away from Blane was a squat brick building, something that was unfortunately highly defensible, in Blane's opinion. Failure to plan would be to plan for failure. Blane planned.

The package—Sgt. Ted Masters, of Beta Team—had been assigned reconnaissance more than two weeks ago. He'd disappeared, and now Alpha Team had found him in the less than tender hands of the Sons of Elijah, a radical splinter group with ties to more Middle Eastern terrorist groups than Blane could keep track of. The ties would be someone else's headache, Blane knew. His assignment was to retrieve Sgt. Masters, preferably alive, extract whatever intelligence he could if it looked as though the intelligence needed emergent extracting, and get the hell out of Dodge. Then Beta Team could swoop in and inflict a little revenge for the treatment that their forward agent had undergone.

Three entrances, each one guarded by a kid who looked like he knew what he was doing with an M-16. The building wasn't large, which meant that the number of people inside would be limited. Blane estimated that the inside crowd couldn't be larger than ten, plus Masters. This was manageable. It would be tricky, it would require good timing, but it could be done without an inordinate amount of luck.

Blane nodded to the man beside him and they moved in, allowing the darkness to cover their forward progress. Charles Grey was Blane's opposite number: where Blane was tall, Grey was short. Blane was cool, calm, and collected; Grey was a cannon that was ready to explode once someone gave permission for the fuse to blow—and sometimes without even a fuse. Still, a good man to have at his side, and Blane had hand-picked every member of his team. He knew his men, and there was a reason that Ryan assigned the most difficult missions to Alpha Team.

Another step, and another. Blane felt more than heard Grey at his heels, each one breathing silently and placing each foot so that not a sound emerged to give them away. Night vision goggles made the landscape stand out in a Mars-like eerie world, everything tinged with red. A flare—the guard in front of them lit a cigarette, inhaling deeply of the nicotine-laced smoke, his automatic weapon dangling at his side. Good; they were still undetected.  
That wouldn't last much longer. Grey and he had advanced as far as they could without detection. It was show time.

Blane tabbed his radio once: a signal.

Nothing was heard, but three bullets arrowed their way toward three deserving targets. Most silencers simply quieted the noise of the shot but these toys, straight from the experimental ballistics lab, did a far better job of muffling the sound. The only way Blane knew that three sentries were no longer on the job was because the sentry guarding the entrance that he and Grey were looking at suddenly flopped over onto the ground and lay there, his life's blood cooling to a dim orange in the artificial light of the night vision goggles. It was a good bet, Blane decided, that the two guarding the other entrances were in a similar condition. The lack of noise tended to confirm his supposition.

Now it was his turn, his and Grey's. The pair didn't wait for any of the others to catch up. It was now time to do something about the weakening screams that floated through the corridors to twist at their guts.

Blane led, followed the sound that needed to be silenced, Grey trailing him and covering their backsides. One soldier emerged from a side door, pulling up his pants and fumbling at his belt buckle.

The automatic would be too noisy. Blane opted for a palm strike to the nose, rocking the soldier back with one powerful blow. He started to move in, and halted. There was no need. The soldier was sprawled on the floor of the john, out cold.

He would be found before too long, but Blane expected to be out of this rat hole before that happened. Killing someone in cold blood was not something that Blane enjoyed doing and if he didn't have to, he wouldn't. The young soldier would live—for now. Whether or not he would enjoy his life after this episode was something that Blane was not about to predict.

They made their way swiftly along the corridors, meeting only one more person and stuffing him into a closet with a broken arm but without consciousness. He too would wake up before long, and it wouldn't matter. Blane and his men would be long gone.

A light at the end of the corridor alerted them—that, and a gurgling sob of a man pushed too far beyond tolerance.

Blane exchanged a glance with Grey. This was it. They had reached their objective, now it was time to acquire the package. As one, they removed their night vision goggles. The room before them was well lit, the better to see the owner of the screams, and night goggles would be a hindrance.

On three. Blane held up his hand. One. Two—

Bam!

Blane slammed open the door with one hand, firing with the other, sensing more than seeing the targets, aiming for the soldiers on the left. Hostage identified; no kill zone established. Grey was on his heels, taking out the remainder on the right.

Not one of the six enemy soldiers had the time to pull his own weapon before he was a dead man. One on the right tried; his automatic was in his hands, and he was swinging it into position when Grey's bullet entered his heart. He tried. He failed. He was too slow.

Blane kept to the plan. He positioned himself by the sole entrance to the room, standing guard, while Grey ministered to the victim who was sliding out of the hard-backed chair now that the additional support—his torturers—were gone. "Betty Blue?" Blane kept only part of his attention on the corridor outside.

"Not good." Grey pulled out medical supplies from his pack. A quick jab, and an intravenous line was started, pouring in life-giving fluids. "Keep breathin', buddy." Morphine followed soon after.

Masters tried. The bubbles of blood seeping out over his bitten lips were evidence of that. Air passed wetly in and out of his lungs. "Jonas…"

This was going to be a deathbed statement. Even a blind man could see that, and Grey was considerably better than that. "Snake Doc," he called.

"Switch places." Blane came over and knelt by the Unit operator gasping his last. "I'm here, Ted."

"Jonas…" Masters worked to get the words out. "I didn't break, Jonas."

"I know that, Ted." It was only the truth. "You're a good man."

The morphine was kicking in, and it helped. The words flowed more smoothly. "I didn't break, Jonas. They didn't get anything out of me."

"Did you find anything?"

"Passed the intel…few days…ago…It's waiting…for pick up…" Now the morphine was taking over; that, or life was receding. Blane feared it was the latter. "Tell Maria…"

Blane leaned over. "Tell Maria what, Ted? Where's the intel?"

"…love…"

His breath seeped out in a final sigh, and Master Sergeant Jonas Blane gently closed the eyes of the man who had given his life for his country. He rose to his feet. "We're done here."

"Not yet, Snake Doc." Grey gestured to the papers in his hands, worry plain on his face. He had dived into the manila folders sitting on the table, knowing what needed to come next and in a hurry to get to it. "These guys knew their stuff. They were tracking his movements, seeing where he went over the past couple of weeks. They must have suspected him. Shaky cover."

"Looking for where he passed his intel." Blane knew that for a fact. It was what any half-competent spy would have done in the same position, and this crowd was considerably more than half-competent.

Williams had replaced Grey by the door, guarding their backs while Gerhardt and Brown swept the building for the remainder of the enemy. He tossed a glance over his shoulder. "So where is the intel? Where did Masters leave it?"

"Damned if I know." Blane surveyed the room, as if the missing intelligence was somehow hidden there. Ridiculous notion, borne out of frustration. "But it sure as hell ain't going to be Masters who tells us where it is."

"Snake Doc." Grey called once again for attention. "Look at this." He held out the papers that the enemy soldiers had collected.

"You think you know where Masters put his intel?"

"Not exactly." Grey was grim. "But I know where they think he did." Several of the papers he held were photographs, big and glossy and easy to see the people immortalized on film. There were several scenes, one of a young mother and her two children getting out of the family car in front of a grocery store. Another showed a pretty blonde entering a large brick building: a school, somewhere in the middle of America, with youngsters milling around and hoping that classes would be canceled for the day. Several more were of an area picnic, with some half dozen military families enjoying the summer season by joining together in a barbecue. Kids danced and played, caught in a moment in time, and the men—and few of the women—played at baseball.

Blane recognized the man at bat: Mack Gerhardt, shirt open and flapping in the gentle breeze. The bat itself was positioned over the man's shoulder, looking for all the world like Dirt Diver was pro. Blane remembered that particular swing: Hector Williams on the mound sailed a curve ball right past Gerhardt's nose, putting Gerhardt's good-natured boasts away along with the batter. There was Ted Masters himself, poised on first and ready to rabbit once the ball was hit. His wife Maria was cheering him on from the sidelines. That had been a good day. That day had been less than two weeks ago.

Masters had already been on his mission. Blane hadn't known then what it was, but he did now. Masters had gone out for a second recon, and hadn't been so fortunate. They'd been waiting for him, the dead soldiers in this very room, and they'd taken him. Three days later, there were too many dead men. Yet, to another way of thinking, there weren't enough: Gerhardt came back to where Blane waited with their dead comrade. "Snake Doc."

"Dirt Diver?"

"I found signs of at least another dozen men squatting here. They were cramped in like sardines in a can." Gerhardt surveyed the dead bodies on the floor, his lips tightening. "We only took out half of 'em."

Blane went cold. The pictures in this room meant that there was another squad of these bastards out looking for Masters's intel, and they'd be looking entirely too close to where Blane and his men lived. There was no time to waste; the collateral damage would hit on a very personal level. "I'm calling this in," he told them grimly.


	3. Looking For Answers

A high percentage of the kids attending school there were army brats, used to military ways and used to having friends pick up and leave whenever orders came through. There was a certain wariness in Lissy's friends' eyes as they took in the appearance of Lissy's father and his team leader—but there was also a certain lack of fear. These kids were used to dealing with the military, both at home and away from it.

Becky was the girl that they were questioning at the moment, along with her sister Danielle. Both were the kinds of girls that Mack preferred his daughter to hang out with: studious and polite, the type to get A's and B's in school instead of detention. Both had long dark hair, although Becky's hair tended toward wavy and Dani's straight.

Not the point of the interview. Mack let Blane handle the questions, the parents hovering in the background.

"Ladies," Sgt. Blane said in his deep voice, treating the girls as though they were older than they were, "this is important. Sgt. Gerhardt's daughter is missing, and you may have been the last two to see her. Remember back to this afternoon: was she at school?"

"Absolutely," Becky nodded. "She was in my algebra class, and she helped me figure out a bunch of quadratic equations. She's pretty good in math," she added.

_Really? News to me. I thought she hated schoolwork in any form._ Mack forced his eyebrows to stay in place, swearing to himself that he would get to know his eldest daughter better if he ever got her back. _When_ he got her back, he amended silently, refusing to entertain any other concept. The thought of life without those blue eyes staring back at him in a combination of love and teenage anger—no. Not going there. They _would_ get her back, he swore.

Jonas Blane was patient. "Was that your last class?" he inquired, keeping it calm, keeping his second in command cool through sheer example.

Becky bobbed her head up and down. "We had to get our stuff to go home," she told him. "Our books, and stuff, from our lockers. We've got a test in English tomorrow—she's in that class with me, too—and we were going to study together at the café before going home. Only she never showed," Becky said, furrowing her brows. She shrugged. "I tried calling her cell, but she never picked up. I just thought maybe she met up with Jimmy or somebody."

"Jimmy?" Blane invited her to expand on the topic.

"Omigod! Jimmy is like the coolest kid in school! He's, like, already talking about applying to West Point, or maybe Annapolis, or something like that!"

"A worthy ambition," Blane allowed.

An expression of worry crossed Becky's face, and her eyes darted to Gerhardt and then away again. "You won't tell her that I told, will you? I mean, like every girl in the school's got a crush on Jimmy. I mean, if she ever finds out that I told her _dad_ about this…"

"I promise I won't say anything," Mack forced himself to say. "Do you think that this Jimmy will know where she is?" _We don't know for certain that those guys snatched her. My daughter is definitely capable of going shopping without telling her mother. And staying out late with kids that I will personally turn over to their parents—or the cops—without thinking twice about it, applying to West Point or no._

"Maybe—" Becky started to say when her sister butted in.

"Nope," Dani said with conviction.

"You dork—"

"Why is that?" Blane interrupted what could easily become an exercise in sibling rivalry.

"'Cause I saw Jimmy with Charlene Tuttle, that's why," Dani smirked.

"No way, dip. Charlene came to the café later. _Without_ Jimmy. So there!"

"Like, maybe he dumped her, too."

"Like, maybe you didn't really see them together."

"Like, maybe you didn't really see Charlene at the café."

"Ladies," Blane interrupted, trying to get the discussion back on track. "I thank you for your assistance in this matter."

"One more question," Mack pushed in. "Did Lissy have her cell phone with her? Could she have left it somewhere?" It would be an explanation for why his daughter wasn't answering her phone.

Becky opened her mouth, but Dani beat her to it. "Nope. I saw her calling someone while she was at her locker. Her locker's a few lockers down from mine. I saw her on the phone."

"Who was she talking to?" Long shot.

Shot down. Dani shrugged, not because she didn't care but because she didn't have an answer. "I don't know. Maybe Iris Gonzalez. They have a science project that they need to work on."

"That's good," Blane said. He straightened up; the interview was over. "Thank you, ladies. You've been a big help."

* * *

"I'm not sure I should be letting you do this…" The principal's voice trailed off nervously. "If you'd like to wait while I call the janitor with the bolt cutter…"

Grey let Hector Williams handle her. His teammate was good at handling people like her, calm and cool and reasoning people into seeing it his way. "We have her parents' permission," Hector pointed out, "and the school is the final arbiter of privacy when it comes to opening up school lockers. A young girl is missing," he reminded the woman. "Minutes are precious; Sgt. Grey is an expert locksmith." Shading the truth; every one of the Unit soldiers could go through a combination lock as though it was made of tinfoil. It wasn't only locksmiths who had that sort of skill. "We need to find out if there is anything here that might let us know where she is. Tell me: is she the type that you think might run off if she was upset?"

The conversation flowed past, and Grey concentrated on the simple combination lock that kept the contents of Lissy Gerhardt's locker private. It was a cheap model, bought at the local supermarket, a three number code that was programmed in at the factory. _Click._ One number identified, and Grey didn't need to see what it was. He did, anyway. If he spun past the second, it would save time to be able to start over with the correct digit.

"Possibly," the principal said doubtfully. "She's a bright young girl, but has a tendency to fly off the handle."

_Click._ Two down, one to go.

Hector pulled the woman away ever so slightly, distancing the noise from Grey. A small part of Charlie appreciated his teammate's thoughtfulness.

"What do you mean? Has Lissy been especially upset recently?"

"I'm not sure I should be sharing this with you…"

"Ms. Sanchez." Hector allowed a stern edge to sidle into his voice. "I can obtain the warrant, but that will waste valuable time while a young girl's life may be in danger. Has Lissy Gerhardt been upset recently?"

_Damn. Missed the third click, the magic door. Back to square one. Shouldn't have been listening to them talk. Lack of concentration can get you killed, mister._

"Children tend to react when there is tension in the home," Principal Sanchez said faintly. "I…I'm going to suggest that you speak to Lissy's parents…"

_Like that's a surprise. Good enough reason not to have kids._

"Enough so that Lissy might run away?" Hector kept his tone even.

"It's so hard to tell…"

_Click. Click. Click._

"Got it." Grey broke up the difficult conversation, knowing without even seeing the principal's face that what she felt was relief at the timely interruption. He slipped the curved metal rod out of its nest, and wrestled the chronically warped door open.

It looked neater than Charlie's own locker from years ago, back when he was in school. That wasn't saying much; _every_ kid's locker had been neater than Charlie's. He wasn't about to say that he hated school…yes, he was. Charles Grey had hated school, and the only reason that he graduated—near the bottom of the class, thank you very much—was because his mother had made him promise to do so before she died. "_Prométame,_" she had insisted, sitting in the hospital bed that the nurses had gotten for her just before the end. "Promise me. Finish school. Get your diploma. Make me proud of you, Carlito."

He'd done it. He'd gotten the diploma, even though she hadn't been there to see it. It had been the longest four months of his life. The plan had been to turn eighteen, drop out of school, and go to work as an apprentice to some electrician and make a boatload of money. _Didn't quite work out that way, did it, Carlito? You were lucky. Your friends, the ones that did drop out: they're dead now. Killed on the street. Gang violence. That could have been you._

Not Lissy Gerhardt. Mack's kid was smart. Maybe she didn't have her head screwed on right all the time, but what kid her age did?

So the question came down to: did she take off on her own and the timing was really _really_ bad, or had some of Masters's playmates give her some help? Grey wasn't about to say which was worse. Both could end up with a dead Gerhardt kid. Of course, scenario number two would also have world intelligence implications, so maybe that made it worse for the world, but Lissy wouldn't be around to care.

Not getting anyone anywhere. Grey focused on the contents of the locker. There were text books, of course, and a bunch of papers stuffed in the bottom. They'd have to go through those papers, to see if there was anything besides discarded class notes. Maybe something that would lead them to that kid Jimmy that Lissy's friends had mentioned. Maybe, maybe not. Lissy's sister Jen didn't know anything about any relationship, which suggested that the idea was all in a teenage girl's fantasies. There were a couple of hooks tacked onto the inside of the door, and one forlorn necklace was draped there. It looked like something that someone had picked up from the leftovers bin at the department store—if it had been Grey, way back in those days, paying for it would have been optional—but it did have an intense green to the fake plastic beads. With the right blouse, it probably looked pretty on Lissy. The overriding plus, for Lissy, would have been that it hadn't been picked out by her mother. Grey could just bet that this locker, over time, had held a bunch of different pieces of costume jewelry that Mack Gerhardt's oldest daughter used that neither Mack nor Tiffy knew about.  
He made himself scan the outline of the locker, observing each and every element with a trained observer's eye. He caught it: a deep scratch in the bland taupe paint that all the lockers were painted. The scratch was fresh; the edges hadn't had a chance to become blurred into the rest with a hint of rust peeking through. Grey peered closer. Yup; definitely fresh, and probably within the last few hours.

"Locker's been breached," he announced.

"It has?" Hector's attention was caught. He pulled away from the principal. He whistled soundlessly. "Recent, too."

"What?" Principal Sanchez tried to peer in, tried to see what they were looking at. "What do you mean? That's not allowed."

Grey let remark slide by. An observation on the nature of reality would only inflame the situation, and they didn't need this principal screeching about police and such. "Next question is, what were they after?"

"What do you mean, 'they'?" Principal Sanchez was getting more and more upset. "Only students and their parents are allowed on school grounds. We keep records, and we post guards."

"I'm sure you do," Hector soothed.

Grey knew what kind of guards were posted: tiny five foot two newbie teachers and overweight retirees willing to work an hour or two for minimum wage and a chance to get out of the house and gossip. Still…"Let's see if your records show anything," he suggested.

Hector wasn't quite finished. "Anything in the locker?"

Grey shrugged, sliding the door closed and re-latching the lock, committing the combination to memory in case it was needed once more. "Not unless someone was interested in the American Revolution."

* * *

Normally Colonel Ryan would have Sgt. Brown conduct the investigation, but in this case Sgt. Brown—along with Mrs. Brown, and Mrs. Blane and Mrs. Gerhardt—were the ones trying to remember every detail they could about a picnic that occurred some two weeks ago.

The only thing going for Mrs. Gerhardt, he decided grimly, was the thought that this would somehow lead them to her daughter. Tiffy kept her other daughter at her side, not even allowing the girl to go to the necessary by herself on a secure army base. _Can't afford to lose both of 'em, is that it, Tiffy?_ Not that he blamed her. No, he blamed himself. He was responsible to look after the families of his men while they were away on a mission, and he'd let 'em down. Didn't matter whether the girl had run away or gotten herself snatched. Fact was, girl was missing on his watch. He needed to rectify the matter.

"Sam and Marjorie Kleinschmidt didn't come," Mrs. Brown was remembering.

"That was right before Marjorie's mother passed," Mrs. Blane agreed. "They went back home to help out."

"What did you ladies talk about?" Colonel Ryan tried to move the discussion along. What he really wanted to ask was _what the hell did Sgt. Masters pass along as a key to his intelligence?_

This was normally when he'd expect Tiffy Gerhardt to say something cute. She'd bat those baby blues at him so's nobody could see that she was serious and make a comment that'd have him tingling in places that he couldn't discuss in polite company and certainly not in front of the wives of his men.

Not now. Right now Mrs. Gerhardt was scared stiff that her husband's career had gotten her daughter killed. If the Gerhardt marriage survived this, it would be a miracle. _Your marriage on again, or off again, Tiffy? Can't keep up with you. Can't figure you out. Can't think straight around you, and right now I got to._

Fortunately, it was Mrs. Brown that answered. "You," she said tartly. _Would've come out a whole lot differently if Tiffy'd said it._ Mrs. Brown was equally scared, scared for her own kids, only hers were a lot less likely to go haring off on their own.

"Let's look at the pictures," Brown suggested, picking up copies of the photos that Alpha Team had acquired while trying to retrieve Sgt. Masters. "Maybe they'll suggest something, something that someone else saw."

"Or thought they saw," Molly Blane added, her thoughts churning. Of them all, Ryan privately thought that she'd be the one to come up with the answer. Sharp as a tack, that woman, and kept Jonas Blane hopping to keep up with her. Good woman, too; knew right from wrong.

Brown knew it, too. "They think that Masters passed something to someone." he said. "I'm not sure how he could have. He played third base most of the time."

"No, he didn't," Kim Brown contradicted. "He was in the outfield."

"Yes, but he was on third for some of it." Tiffy agreed with Bob. "Remember? I slid into third base when Mack hit a double. I thought that it was going to be a homer, but then somebody picked it up on the bounce—"

"That was Charlie," Molly murmured.

Tiffy nodded. "Charlie grabbed it on the bounce and threw it in. I slid into third—"

_Looked mighty damn purty with the third base dirt on your nose, Mrs. Gerhardt._

"—and Ted Masters gave me a hand to stand up," she finished. "So he must have been covering third base for part of the game."

Mrs. Blane frowned. "Your team had four runs that inning," she remembered. "Yours was number three, Tiffy. Who else was playing on your team?"

"It was me, and Mack, and…"

"We were going to call it the Gerhardt team, because me and Lissy were playing too, Mom," Jen inserted. "Then nobody decided on any names. We just played without. I got a hit in the sixth inning."

"She did," Kim agreed. "And, Tiffy, Lissy batted ahead of you. Wasn't she standing on third base for a while?"

"She was," Molly affirmed. "There were two outs in between you. I remember wondering if she'd be able to run home. She and Sgt. Masters talked," Molly said, seeing the picture in her mind's eye. "From a distance, I thought that perhaps they were just exchanging jokes about the game, but now I'm not so certain."

Ryan sorted through the photos. He selected one in particular. "Like this?"

The photo showed Sgt. Masters perched beside third base, Lissy Gerhardt with her toe just barely touching the heavy pad. Lissy's head was turned toward the man, hair swirling with the movement, a moment's action caught in time.

Bob arrowed in. "Shouldn't she have been watching the action? Waiting for the ball to be hit?"

"Sgt. Masters was talking to her," Molly pointed out. "See? His lips are open. He's talking."

"Where's his other hand?" Kim wanted to know. "I see the one with the baseball glove. Where's his other hand?"

"It's in his pocket," Molly decided. "I'd say that's a foolish place for it to be, with another batter up."

"He was taking something out," Tiffy said flatly. "He took something out, and gave it to my daughter." _He put my daughter at risk, Mack Gerhardt. Don't you think that I'll forgive you for that. Not now. Not ever. Nor you, Tom Ryan._

"We don't know that for certain, Tiffy," Bob said, trying to smooth things over, sharing an uneasy glance with his wife. "He could have been reaching for a handkerchief."

"Handkerchiefs don't get people killed!"

_You'd be surprised what a Unit operative can do with a simple piece of linen._ Ryan kept the expression off of his face.

"There's a bit of a smile," Molly Blane pointed out. "I'd say he was pleased about something." She turned to Colonel Ryan. "Have you spoken to Maria Masters?"

"Yes." Ryan kept it short. Sgt. Masters's wife hadn't been able to tell him much through her tears. It was one of _those_ times, times when he very much regretted accepting the promotion. Hah; these days, what with the damn politics and all, anybody accepting a promotion had to be soft in the head. Easier to retire a twenty year man and collect a fat pension and head out to do some fishin' for another twenty. "Whatever it was, Sergeant Masters didn't share it with his wife." _'Cause he knew that she would be the first place that they'd go lookin'. Fortunately for us, she works as civilian support on base. They couldn't get to her before us._ "We went through her things; nothing new, and nothing that would give us any answers." His voice went flat. "Somebody had broken into their home, though, went through their things. Somebody professional did it; the lock was picked clean as a whistle."

Kim perked her head up. "Maybe they found what they were looking for." _In which case, we can go home._

Her husband gave her arm a tender squeeze. "Don't think so, honey."

"Why not—oh." Kim's face fell. If they'd found what they were looking for, Lissy Gerhardt wouldn't be missing.

Molly kept staring at the picture. "He gave her something," she decided. "I'm certain of it. Sergeant Masters gave Lissy something, and told her to keep it safe for him. I'm sure that he didn't know that anyone was watching, and that he'd be able to retrieve it." She turned to Tiffy. "Tiffy, did Lissy say anything about receiving something?"

"No…"

"She wouldn't have told, not if Sergeant Masters had asked her not to," Kim Brown put in. "Tiffy, did Lissy have anything new, maybe something that you thought she bought? A scarf, maybe, or new earrings?" She glanced at her husband. "There was a silly spy show on the other night, where the spy hid a microchip in a pair of diamond earrings. The diamonds were so big that they looked fake," she added, trying to keep the hunger out. "It was pretty silly."

_And gettin' baubles like that on a master sergeant's pay is silly, too; that what you're sayin', Ms. Brown? Better get used to the fake stuff._

But Tiffy Gerhardt looked as though she'd been struck. Her hand trembled, down in her lap where she thought no one could see it. "A locket." She turned those big blue eyes onto Tom Ryan, and he felt as though someone had shoved a cold poker up his spine. "A locket," Tiffy choked out. "She had a locket. Gold, with a little chain. I didn't even think to ask where she'd gotten it. I'd just assumed that she'd bought it at the mall…" A tear squeezed out, and she dashed it away. "Lissy hasn't been to the mall in over three weeks!"

It was a chance to put this mission to bed. "Mrs. Gerhardt, where is that locket? She have it on her?"

"No." Tiffy was shaking. "No, she lost it, I don't know where. She tried to look for it, couldn't find it this morning."

That didn't sound right. "Could they have already taken it from her? Found it somewhere, maybe in Tiffy's home?" Kim asked.

Bob dashed their hopes. "No. If that were the case, they wouldn't have taken Lissy. There would be no need to."

Ryan forced the hard-ass Unit ops colonel to take over. "That's it, then. Good chance that Sgt. Masters, knowing that he was being watched, passed the locket on to your daughter, Ms. Gerhardt, for safe-keeping. I expect he thought that he'd be able to retrieve it fairly soon. He didn't realize that they spotted the pass, or he never would have done it. He would've pulled the plug on the mission and bailed out." He pulled out his cell phone, motioning to Sgt. Brown to accompany him. "You ladies stay right here. Mrs. Gerhardt, we are going to get your daughter back."


	5. Survival

"We have possibilities for where the necklace could have been lost." Master Sergeant Jonas Blane summed it up for the group. "The Gerhardt residence, and the Brown residence. There is also the less likely chance that Ms. Gerhardt could have lost it at her school or anywhere along the road that she walked, however she—and we—believe otherwise. Therefore we have two houses to search before we expand our radius of interest. Any questions?"

There were none.

This was not the usual grouping, and it was not comprised only of Unit soldiers. The best eyes to spot something out of place were those who inhabited the homes, the ones who routinely picked up this and that after children and husbands, thus Kim Brown was accompanying her husband. Molly Blane too had been in each house often enough to be of assistance, and she was part of the group.

Tiffy Gerhardt was not. Both Mack and Tiffy Gerhardt were in the infirmary with their daughter, convincing themselves that she would be all right and agonizing over every new cut or bruise that revealed itself. It didn't matter that none of the injuries were serious of themselves. All the damage was on the inside, where it didn't show. There would be many nights ahead of all three with nightmares.

Colonel Ryan too had creases lining tired eyes. He had had words with his men earlier, and they were not good ones. "Masters was infiltrating a local terrorist group," he informed the soldiers—but not their wives. The Unit soldiers had not needed to know that bit of intelligence before their mission, but they did now. "He set himself up as a disillusioned soldier, back from a tour in Afghanistan, someone who wanted to fight on the side of the Taliban. We knew that the cell was in the area, but not where, and we didn't know the players." He nodded to Blane. "They'll have to move now. You cleared out a bunch of the bastards, but what you found suggests that there's a whole mess more of 'em. The clean up team pretty much verified that the building where you found Ms. Gerhardt was their hangout. They'll be wanting to replace a good deal of hardware as well that we've relieved them of."

"Which also means," said Blane in his deep tones, "that their current whereabouts are unknown."

"There is that," Ryan agreed.

Brown hit the other question. "What intel was Masters after? I'm assuming that you didn't assign him to just hunt down a single cell."

"Good question, sergeant," Ryan said. "You're right; there's more. The original stuff that he passed suggested that there was going to be a major offensive somewhere in the mid-west. He was going to make another pass the day of the picnic. You'll recall that I too attended that little shindig for a time, but Masters failed to make the pass. I assumed that he hadn't gotten the intel that he thought he could, and was going back out after it. It appears I was wrong."

"Or _he_ was," Brown said thoughtfully. "Masters may have gotten into more than he thought. He may not have realized it until too late."

"Which means that we still need to find the necklace that he gave to Mack's daughter." Blane summed it up. "And the most likely place for her to have lost it is in her house."

"Or mine." Bob Brown grimaced. "Who's up for peering through a dirty diaper bag?"

* * *

"Halt!" Blane barked.

Both Molly Blane and Charlie Grey froze.

"Top?"

"The lock's been tampered with." The tiny silver scrapings were a clear indication to anyone who knew what to look for. Master Sergeant Jonas Blane knew what to look for.

They were outside Gerhardt's own home, the one he'd spent the last several years in, raising two daughters and trying to keep a wife happy. The Unit soldier had repaired more leaky faucets than he knew he had. Every blade of grass had his name on it. He had put a key into the lock of the front door several thousand times, sometimes during the day but more often in the dead of night, toting home a rifle that wasn't just for show. Now there were bright and shiny scratches on that door lock, and they had more than a little significance.

Blane also knew what to do in this situation, one where a civilian—his wife—was present. "Molly."

"Jonas?"

"Do exactly as I say. Go back to the car and turn the engine on. If you hear gunfire, drive off immediately. If Grey and I aren't out in five minutes, drive immediately away from here and call Colonel Ryan. Understand?"

"I'm going." She gave him a look that said plenty: _Be careful. I have plans for the rest of our lives._

"I will," Blane muttered under his breath. "I will." He pulled out his comm. link. "Cool Breeze."

He could see the other group halfway down the block and pulling into Brown's own driveway. No one emerged from the vehicle, and Blane knew that Brown was holding back his wife as well as Williams.

"Snake Doc?"

"We have a situation, Cool Breeze. Target appears to have been breached. Repeat: target may have been comprised. Proceed with caution."

"Acknowledged. Out."

The emergent communication had been dealt with. Blane switched the channel. "Snake Doc to Home Base."

"Go ahead, Snake Doc." Sgt. Medawar, as always, was ready.

"Be advised that the target may have been breached. Repeat: target may have been breached. We are proceeding with caution."

"Acknowledged, Snake Doc." There was a pause. "Back up is on the way."

"Thank you, Home Base. Snake Doc out."

This had just gotten more personal, and Blane did not like it one little bit. There hadn't been much time between the rescue of Lissy Gerhardt and Alpha Team's arrival at the Gerhardt homestead. There was a very real possibility that the enemy soldiers were inside the house at this very minute. Blane listened with his ear to the door.

His hand went up in a silent signal to Grey: one inside. Two. Three. Three intruders, going through the contents of the house, hunting for the locket. Blane wished them luck, for if they found the necklace Blane and Grey would take it away from them and thank them for their hard work in locating it. It would make life easier for the Unit men.

Grey was not standing around, waiting for orders. He sidled under the front window, crouched over to keep from being seen. He too put his ear to the wall, to echo-locate the enemy inside. One more, tossing everything in one of the bedrooms, and Blane would just bet that the bedroom belonged to one of Gerhardt's daughters. Four, then; four enemy soldiers. Blane motioned Grey back.

This would be tricky. There were two of them, and four of the enemy, and Blane wanted to do as little damage to the furniture as possible. _Tiffy won't thank you for her grandmother's rocker reduced to kindling, sergeant._ To make matters worse, one or possibly more by now had moved into other rooms, protected from the surprise assault. Blane wished that he could call Brown and Williams from their own part of the mission but if the locket had been mislaid in Brown's home? They might as well hand the necklace over to the terrorists on a silver tray. Not about to happen.

No help for it. This would be fast, and they'd either walk out unharmed or not at all. Jonas spared a moment to gesture at his wife in the driver's seat of the car: _go. Don't wait._ A growl of an engine turning over let him know that this time, at least, she hadn't argued. A second mechanized growl told him that Kim Brown had received and carried out the same orders.

Gun drawn, Blane checked the knob to the door. Good: unlocked. The men inside had failed to lock it against just this occurrence, and Blane would make use of their carelessness. Grey positioned himself opposite his team leader, nerves rock steady and ready.

Blane held up his hand, the one with the gun. Three, two, one—

Blane shoved the door open. One hastily aimed shot, and he dove to the floor. A second shot, and another body jerked in shock. It was only then that he saw that his aim of his first shot had been true. A third body flopped over the first: Grey had been equally as accurate.

A shout; another shot buzzing out from the back room close enough for a shave. Blane shoulder-rolled over, aiming for the sofa. Stuffing fluffed out in response to the next shot but the bullet failed to penetrate through the entire set of cushions. _Sorry, Mrs. Gerhardt. Gonna be a bit of damage to the premises._

Another shot, and a gurgle. The last body staggered out, blood squirting from his neck. The man's eyes rolled up into his head, and he crashed to the carpeted hallway floor. Grey blew across his automatic artistically, taking credit for the kill.

Silence; the house was empty of enemy soldiers. Blane grimaced. There were three blood stains on the living room carpet, and another spreading through the hall. Getting those out would be a problem that even house cleaning specialists wouldn't be able to conquer, and Blane didn't foresee bringing home young Ms. Gerhardt into such surroundings. There would be new carpets laid, no matter what the cost.

Grey spoke. "They didn't find it, Top. If they had, they would have been out of here."

Blane had to agree. "You start here. Look through everything. See if you can find that locket. I'll head down the street and see if Brown and Williams need back up."

"Got it. The back up should be here any minute. They can help search." Grey started going through drawers, concentrating on the ones that hadn't yet been touched. "They can also see about putting this place back together again. It's a mess." _And remove the bodies,_ he left unsaid.

There would be thorough searching of those bodies, Blane knew. Fingerprints would be taken, and photos circulated. Their movements would be traced, hopefully back to someone higher in the chain of terrorist command. If nothing else, they'd eliminated a few more enemies of civilization.

* * *

The key in his pocket helped. The click sound loud to Bob Brown's ears, but he knew that it was no more than a pin dropping onto a cushion. He eased the door opened, listening for sounds in his home.

The living room was a mess. The furniture had been upturned, and the stuffing ripped out. Cushions were thrown everywhere. Three drawers from the china cabinet had been pulled from their nest and their contents dumped onto the floor. Plates had been pulled from their spots on the shelving, and Brown bit back a curse. One of those broken plates had been an heirloom from Kim's grandmother. It had ridden across the Great Plains during the expansion west. It had survived famine, drought, Indian attacks—it hadn't survived this.

He could hear the man—a singleton—in the back bedroom, in Teddy's nursery, and he gave thanks that his family was safe. Teddy and Serena were still on base under the watchful eye of some privates commandeered for babysitting duty, and Kim was speeding her way back to base. That fear was off of his mind. He eased through the kitchen and opened the back door for Hector Williams to join him.

Communication stayed silent. One finger went up—one enemy only—and pointed toward the back bedrooms. Williams nodded, and offered to lead. Brown shook his head. He _wanted_ this bastard who had invaded the sanctity of his home!

They crept up on the noises in the bedroom, Williams trailing him. Brown knew exactly where to put his feet so that the floor boards didn't creak, and Williams copied his every move.

The man wasn't trying to be quiet. He had no idea that he wasn't the only person in the house, and he was looking for something small and shiny. Brown could imagine the thoughts in the man's head: the necklace had dropped off an unsuspecting neck, only to be snatched up by an infant who toddled off to his room to drop it into a toy box.

The man clearly was not a father, had not raised children, or he would have known that the necklace wouldn't have gone to Teddy's room. It would have gone into Teddy's mouth, which meant that they would be watching Teddy's diaper's very closely for the next few days. Could an x-ray reveal if that were the case? Brown resolved to ask. It would prevent a very stinky job.

Back to the mission at hand. It would be more than easy to put a single bullet into the back of the man's head, but that would prevent a thorough interrogation after capture. More: they had just finished paying for the nursery carpet, and Brown wasn't at all certain that even the best carpet cleaners would be able to get out the mess if a few cups of blood leaked out of the man's head and onto the deep shag. Sergeant Bob Brown had better uses for his paycheck.

More: the enemy's gun was tucked into his waistband, useless until drawn. This was a golden opportunity, and Brown resolved to make the most of it. He holstered his own weapon and gestured to Williams, communicating his plan. Williams nodded.

Silence was golden, and the carpet hushed his footsteps. He took care to keep his shadow from alerting the man, creeping up from behind. Another few inches, three more…

Brown grabbed the man from behind just as the enemy decided that the necklace could be hidden in an open package of disposable diapers. One long arm snaked around the man's neck and the other went for the carotid, pressing hard. Williams moved in on the pair, snatching the deadly automatic weapon from the man's belt before he could pull it out himself.

Another minute, more pressure; Brown felt the man slump as consciousness left the body. He held his pose for another long moment: it wouldn't be the first man who'd tried to sucker an attacker into letting down his guard too soon. Besides, this man left a hell of a mess to clean up, and he _deserved_ the headache that he'd wake up to! Brown had no regrets over the takedown.

Blane's voice floated in. "Clear?"

"Clear," Brown called back. "We're in Teddy's room."

Blane entered, his large frame momentarily blocking the light from the hall. "Anything?"

"We just cleaned house," Williams told him, indicating the unconscious man on the floor of the nursery. "The hired help was doing a lousy job."

"I see." Blane looked over the room. "Just the one?"

"Just the one," Brown confirmed. He frowned and jerked his thumb toward the rest of the house. "He trashed my living room, and then he started in here. He was still looking, so he hadn't found anything. How about yours?"

"Four," Blane replied. "They too were still looking."

Williams looked grim. "We still think the necklace is here?"

"Unless you have a better idea." Blane was open to all thoughts.

"Lost and found at the school?" Then he shook his head. "Not a chance. If she lost it there, some other kid likely picked it up and kept it. We'll never get it back."

Blane looked around at the devastation. There would be a lot of work ahead of someone to put this home back together, and Blane didn't relish the thought of being the one to announce the news. Best to allow the forensics teams to go through each home and sift through the debris before permitting either the Gerhardt or the Brown family to return home. Another thought: he would recommend to Colonel Ryan that a detail be ordered to do the best they could to straighten things up a bit before allowing the ladies to return. The wives didn't have to know that all the work they'd put into making homes for their families had been ruined. They'd see too much of it soon enough.

Grey joined them. " Clean up squads have arrived," he announced. "Little late for the gun play, but they were ready. They're already working on Mack's place, looking for the package." He scanned the territory. "Nice. I'd fire your housekeeper if I were you, Brown."

Brown grimaced, and indicated the still unconscious body on the floor. "I did."

"Not soon enough. You're not gonna let Kim back here, are you?"

"Not unless I have to," Brown told him. "Nor the kids, though I don't relish the thought of keeping them on the base proper. No playgrounds, and at this age, that's a must have."

Grey poked his nose into Brown's daughter's room. "This one looks okay. They didn't get into here."

Brown followed him in. "You see anything?"

"Not me." Grey scanned the chest of drawers, noting the careful lining up of several toy store items, all made of plastic and glittery to catch a child's eye. "She practicing to catch a rich man?"

"Won't be you, my friend. Won't be you." Brown looked over the collection, pulling out each drawer and poking through to make certain that the all important locket wasn't there. "Serena's latest obsession is shopping. She wants to be a salesgirl when she grows up. She found that she can get a discount from the store if she does."

"I wasn't aware that a lady of her tender years knew what a discount was." Blane followed them in.

"She doesn't, but that's not stopping her." Brown again looked through the collection of items to be 'sold'. "Damn. This was the best spot to look." He sighed. "We'll have to keep looking."

* * *

Colonel Ryan was not happy. "CIA just confirmed: six more terrorists slipped in through Dulles, and three through O'Hare. Two got caught at Customs but the rest got past before anyone could say 'boo'. Now, we don't know for certain that they're headed in this direction…"

"But we don't know that they're not." Blane finished the sentence for his superior. He leaned back in his chair, Ryan's desk in front of him, regarding the colonel and thinking his own thoughts. His eyes automatically strayed to the map on the wall that outlined the Middle Eastern region.

"Whatever they think Ted Masters had must have been kind of important to create this much of a ruckus," Gerhardt drawled, his blue eyes cold as ice. His own chair was balanced on two legs only, as on edge as the man himself. "Somebody somewhere is pretty upset."

There were more lines creasing Gerhardt's brow than usual, Ryan noted. "We're seein' some movement in the mountains bordering Afghanistan and Pakistan," he added. "Little more than usual, that is." Ryan sighed heavily. "I'd sure appreciate somebody comin' up with an idea as to where that damn necklace could be. I don't think any of those fellows are gonna go back to where they belong and leave law-abiding folks alone before it's found."

"We've been through yours and my houses twice over," Brown grouched to Gerhardt. "It's not there."

"What about letting the wives go home?" Williams asked. "Wouldn't they be able to spot anything faster than any of us?"

"Not with those terrorists comin' into the area, Williams," Ryan declared. "Gettin' onto the base will be more difficult with us on alert, but I ain't about to chance it. The word on the street is that the fellows that are on the way are a mite smarter than average. No, the ladies will be staying here where it's safe until we get this cleared up. Along with your kids, Brown," he added with a half-glare. "The pair of 'em are busy enough to wear out half a dozen privates, keepin' 'em entertained. I've half a mind to put those two in charge of boot camp to weed out the sissies."

"It's how I keep my girlish figure," Brown told him. The humor fell flat. Brown let it lay there, on the linoleum floor.

"I don't think…" Gerhardt trailed off. A light sparked in his eye.

Blane came on point. "Mack?"

"If it's not in your house or mine, Brown, then it has to be either at Lissy's school or somehow connected with it," Gerhardt mused.

"But if somebody picked it up—" Williams started.

Gerhardt cut him off. "What if they didn't? What if we could find out _who_ picked it up?"

"How are we going to tell who…" Brown did his own trailing off. "The cameras," he said flatly. "The school security cameras. They monitor every entrance and exit."

"And the hallways," Gerhardt added triumphantly. "Lookee' here," he told them, letting the chair back onto all four legs. "We trace all the possible spots that Lissy could have been. She knew that she had the necklace when she left school, so we track along the path that she walked."

"But what if she dropped it somewhere in school, and somebody picked it up?" Grey asked.

"We still got a shot at finding it," Gerhardt told him. "We go through the camera footage, looking for anyone who bends down and picks something up. We question those kids."

Ryan nodded, satisfaction oozing. "They might not come forward with it, but they ain't likely to lie to our faces about finding that necklace, not when they hear that a few dozen terrorist types are comin' into town loaded for bear. I think you're onto something, Gerhardt." He made the decision. "Move on out, men."


	8. Long Night

Two men, both expert marksmen, at Snake Doc's disposal. Blane stopped them at the equipment house at the edge of the field. "We hold here," he ordered. "Pick 'em off from the rear until our relief arrives. Stay under cover."

Brown's eyes flashed with an argument, but it didn't reach his mouth. It was his daughter out there with Betty Blue—but getting himself killed wasn't the way to rescue her. He had to trust that his brother soldier would protect his little girl.

Not his first option. The handgun that was a part of him was short range, and would only reach to the edge of the wave of the enemy, but he had nothing better. Not unless he wanted to go up against them with the knife that was tucked into a sheath along his calf. _Didn't know that I've been carrying that all the time, did you, Kim? I only take it off when I'm in bed with you. You probably wouldn't be happy knowing that I have it on around the kids. Glad I've got it now. I may need it._

"On my mark." Snake Doc could have been ordering his steak medium-well done. Brown tried match the man's cool. He sighted on a running target.

"Fire."

Three shots sounded as one, and three figures dropped.

"Good," Snake Doc commented. "Fire at will."

"Take out as many of the bastards as you can until they realize that we're here," Dirt Diver added, more to himself than the others. "Then fall back." He glared at Blane. "You do realize that we won't get many of them with these pea shooters."

"That will not be a problem, Dirt Diver." Blane jerked his thumb toward the main building. "Our first set of reinforcements has arrived. Don't shoot him."

It was Hector Williams, heavy-burdened with long range rifles and enough night vision goggles to outfit them all. He handed them out.

More enemy soldiers dropped.

* * *

"I got a fifty count, Colonel! More just came over the fence!"

"I hear you, Rodriguez." _You don't have to shout. Where the hell they all coming from? I gotta have me a serious discussion with the local FBI office ricki-tick._ "Horner, you get those squads out and over to the back field, you hear?"

"Yes, sir. First squad away, under Velvet Fist. He's got Iron Horse pulling together the second."

Good. Both men were from Beta Squad. Their new teams were grunts and recruits from the other side of the base, but Velvet Fist and Iron Horse would make 'em give a good account of themselves. The enemy would know that they'd been in a fight, by damn. "Medawar, let Snake Doc know that his relief should be there any second."

* * *

Objective one: retrieve a certain gold locket with enough intel to justify attacking an army base filled with pissed off soldiers. Objective two: rescue a little girl whose only mistake was to be out in the middle of a battlefield. Oh, yes, and objective three: rescue a certain Betty Blue who was busy trying to achieve objectives one and two.

_Rescue,_ not retrieval of the bodies of Betty Blue and his charge. Rescue meant live bodies. Retrieval meant turning to Kim Brown and saying, "I'm sorry for your loss." Five simple words, so difficult to say. Blane did not want to say those words, not to Kim Brown and not to Cool Breeze beside him.

He didn't need to hear it in his earpiece that the numbers of the enemy had just doubled. He could see it through his night goggles, saw another wave coming over the fence. Where the hell was back up? How long did it take to get a squad of soldiers together? Snake Doc was going to recommend that the entire base start practicing readiness drills. They ought to be able to scramble faster than that.

There they were, led by Velvet Fist, the team leader of Beta Squad. The Unit soldier was holding back to make certain that the Regular Army types weren't left behind. In the distance was another squad of twenty; probably being put through their paces by Iron Horse who would be giving them a tongue lashing worse than any Marine drill sergeant. Come to think of it, Iron Horse had _been_ a Marine drill sergeant before he'd seen the Unit light.

Time to move out. Beta Squad could handle the invasion. Alpha Squad needed to make the rescue and secure the package of gold. Snake Doc nudged Dirt Diver. "We need a direction."

Gerhardt snarled under his breath. "Which way would Betty Blue jump?" He cast an unreadable look toward Cool Breeze. "Especially when he's got a kid to protect?"

Cool Breeze's hand didn't shake on his weapon. His aim, taking down one more enemy soldier, was rock solid and deadly.

Snake Doc spoke quietly, challenging each of the others to add more. "Betty Blue has two choices: run toward the base and safety, or head deeper into the woods. He goes to the woods; why?"

"'Cause he'd collect one in the back if he heads for base," Gerhardt answered immediately. "Too far away to run. Not with a bunch of pissant terrorists on his ass."

"So they're too close for him to run. Can he run through the woods?"

"Not with a little girl," Williams said grimly, "and he's not about to leave her behind." _It's what he should have done, if he was following the rules. That intel is worth more than one life, even if it belongs to a little girl. You understand what risk Betty Blue is taking for your daughter, Cool Breeze?_

Blane nodded in agreement. "He goes to ground. Where? Dirt Diver, you've trained men in tactics in these woods."

Gerhardt grunted. "I got six places, easy."

"Defensible?"

"Some are. Some aren't. Some are just holes to hide in. Worthless if your enemy has night vision."

"And they don't," Blane said. "How close?"

"Some close, some far, way out towards the north end." Gerhardt considered. "If he's headed for those, he's still running. It'd take him twenty minutes to travel that route, more with a kid."

Blane spoke into his comm. unit. "Base."

"Go ahead, Snake Doc."

"Any communication with Betty Blue?"

"That's a negative, Snake Doc. No sign of Betty Blue or of Little Dolly."

"Acknowledged. Snake Doc out." So Bob Brown's daughter had acquired her own call sign. Blane hoped that she'd stay alive to appreciate it. He turned back to the others. "Scratch the hidey holes furthest out. If Betty Blue was running, he'd have called in his position."

"Which means that he's in a situation where he can't." Brown was bleak. _He's either hiding with the enemy on top of him, or he's dead. And if he's dead, so is my daughter._

"We need to push the enemy away from him and Little Dolly," Blane decided. He scanned the forest in front of him. The trees were dotted with red figures picking their way through the underbrush, hunting. There were too many for his small team to make a difference, and the trees that had protected Betty Blue and Little Dolly from flying bullets did the same for the enemy combatants.

"Or pull."

"Dirt Diver?"

"They're still looking." Gerhardt explained his idea. "They're hunting, and they're taking their time until somebody starts pushing them out. They think he's close in, just like we do. And they know that we have to be careful. We want our guy alive. They don't care whether he's alive or dead. So what if they think he's further out than he is? Maybe he ran for a while, got a head start."

"You're thinking to set up a decoy?"

"I am," Gerhardt confirmed. A wicked light came into his eye. "Let me have a few grenades and Hammerhead here, 'cause I _know_ he can scream like a little girl."

* * *

"Not a sound," Charlie whispered into Serena's ear.

He could feel her nod her understanding onto his chest. There were places that they could hide in these woods, and he'd done that during training missions. He'd been good at it, too. Maybe not as good as Dirt Diver—the man was a ghost in the trees—but still pretty damn good.

This was different. He needed to hide a kid, Bob Brown's kid, and a kid that he couldn't count on not to start crying for her mommy. Hell, Charlie Grey wouldn't have minded crying for his mommy, too. Anybody who could get them out of this mess would be welcome.

How had it gone so bad so fast? Serena led him to the necklace, and bam! He was under fire.

One blessing: the enemy didn't have night vision. Their sight was just as good—or as bad—as his own. Two blessings: Betty Blue had a head start on them, into the forest. Three blessings: Grey had trained in these woods, and he knew where the hiding places were.

Now the bad: the kid who would start crying at any moment, and the necklace that he couldn't afford to let into the wrong hands. More bad: there were more enemy soldiers than he could count on one hand or even two hands and two feet, and that meant he was substantially outnumbered. The little handgun at his waist would be worse than useless. One shot, and they'd be on him like flies to horse manure. No, best to hold that option for last. Even toggling his comm. link would be too loud for comfort. The enemy was close enough to hear that, too.

Serena clung to his chest, and he kept one arm wrapped around her, marveling at light she was. He'd take that as another positive. He could carry her for miles if he had to.

Assuming that no one shot him in the back. That would be bad.

A flurry of shots rang out. His side, come to rescue them? Probably not; it didn't sound like the ammo that his side used, not to his trained ear. Somebody disturbed a deer, and it went crashing off toward some place quieter, escaping from the trouble.

Charlie wished he could do the same.

* * *

A flat out run around the perimeter: Dirt Diver and Hammerhead reached their destination within minutes. Neither one was winded. Both were determined.

Hand signals only: place that grenade there. Another one over there. Cover them with leaves. Hang a jacket up on a branch to twist in the wind, make it look like a man in the dark of early evening.

Hammerhead screeched like a little girl, pitching his voice higher than any man had a right to. "Daddy! Daddy!"

Now wait until several someones got closer.

* * *

Blane held up a fist: _halt._ They were at the closest hiding place, one that was defensible should a man with a little girl choose to hole up in there. He listened, as did Brown beside him: nothing. Nothing but the breeze slipping by.

That was not all that they had. They had night vision goggles, instruments that relied on heat to detect people who didn't want to be detected. They had them, and the invaders didn't; it was as simple as that. Blane peered through the goggles, hoping to see the vestiges of two warm bodies seeping out from behind the covering boulders.

Nothing. This was not where they would find Betty Blue and, as they had christened her, Little Dolly.

* * *

There! Betty Blue defied even Dirt Diver to find them here.

It was a short cliff, one that even Serena could jump down from and come up smiling, with a thick stone slab overhead to keep the opening clear. Of course, if she jumped she'd land in the babbling brook down below and at this of year it would be as cold as an ice cube, but Charlie had no intention of allowing her to jump out. No, he intended to remain inside the shallow cave halfway up the face of the cliff until the enemy got tired of looking for him. He smirked to himself, knowing that no one could see the expression. Even if Serena started to cry a bit, the sound of the creek below would cover the noise. His jacket would muffle the rest. They were safe.

Come sun up, he could turn his comm. link back on and call in. It would be a tough wait for Brown and for his wife through the night, but better safe than sorry. Sorry meant that Betty Blue would have a hole in his jacket that extended through something precious. Sorry meant that Sgt. and Mrs. Brown would never get the opportunity to see their little girl go off to the prom, graduate from high school, and do all the other things that little girls should grow up to do. Brown could damn well wait until Charlie crawled out, lifted Serena out of their hidey hole, and called in their location.

Charlie wrapped his arms around the little girl, keeping her warm. It was going to be a long night.


	10. A Heavy Price

Kim Brown would have run ahead, leaving her escort behind, except that she didn't know which direction to go. "They've found her? Is she all right? Where is she?"

"I don't know, ma'am. Colonel said to bring you." Rodriguez was hustling.

That was all right with Serena's mother. She saw Colonel Ryan through the glass wall and burst in. "Colonel!"

He held up a hand, holding her back for a moment. "Still getting the triangulation, Snake Doc. This close in, gonna take some time." Without missing a beat, he pointed Kim to Sgt. Medawar, indicating that she was to join the communications woman.

Medawar too spotted her, didn't pause in speaking into the mike, motioning Kim into the seat beside her. "That's right, Serena. I want you to keep talking to me. I've got your mommy right here, honey."

"Serena?" Kim grabbed the headset that Medawar offered.

"Mommy?"

A choir of angels couldn't have sounded any more precious. "Mommy's here, sweetie. Are you all right?"

"'M cold, mommy. And it's dark!" The last came out in a childish wail.

"Daddy's coming to get you, honey." That was a promise that Kim Brown knew was happening. _Nothing_ would keep her husband from his quest and _nothing_ would stop him.

"Keep her talking," Medawar hissed. "Get her to tell you where she is. Is Grey with her?"

Kim obeyed. "Honey, is Uncle Charlie with you?"

"Y—yes."

"Can I talk to him?"

"He won't wake up, Mommy! Not even when I talk to him."

Cold seeped into Kim's belly. Dead? She couldn't let that stop her. Her daughter _needed_ her. "He's just sleeping, honey," she said, hoping that it wasn't a lie. "Where are you?"

"Uncle Charlie took me into the forest, where you said not to go." _Boy, was Uncle Charlie gonna get it when Mommy got through with him! You don't argue with Mommy! Not even Daddy argued with Mommy!_

"That's okay, honey," Kim promised. "Is that where you are now? In the forest? Are there trees around you?"

"It's dark, mommy. And I'm scared!"

* * *

Ryan's voice echoed from more than one comm. link. Each of the four had their earwhigs inserted, listening to every word. "She's saying it's dark where she is."

Blane cast an eye toward the sky. "Sun's up. Shouldn't be dark if she's in the forest. Could they have been taken by the intruders? Maybe they're in a truck somewhere, maybe a building without windows."

"Don't think so, Snake Doc. We're reviewin' the tapes. 'Cept for the bunch that scrambled over the north wall before Velvet Fist got to 'em, nobody wandered off. 'Sides, she's not talkin' about movin' anywhere. Doesn't think she went anywhere after Betty Blue and she hunkered down. No vehicles that we can tell." He paused. "We got a line of sight for you, Snake Doc."

"Lay it out." Gerhardt already had a map of the area spread onto the ground.

Ryan named the coordinates, and Gerhardt traced a line along the paper map. "Nowhere near the north end," he said unnecessarily. "We were right. Betty Blue stayed close to home."

"Where along this line?" Brown wanted to know. "We've searched all through here. Where is he?" _And where is my daughter?_

"We'll get a better fix once they get a triangulation point," Williams mused.

"Spread out," Blane ordered. "We'll take this as our starting point, and assume three paces to either side of this line with another three paces beyond that. We'll walk the line and see what we can find until they can give us a more exact site. Move out."

The four men positioned themselves to flank the line on the map that they'd identified, listening hard for the sound of a child crying, wondering if they were in the right place. Each one tried to figure out how Brown's daughter could be in the dark in the forest if the sun was up. It didn't make sense.

"He's tried for a hidey hole in the trees before," Williams offered grimly. "Last training mission we went on, other side missed him for four hours."

"Your daughter could be stuck inside a hole in a tree trunk," Gerhardt suggested doubtfully. "That would account for no light."

Brown disagreed. "Serena climbs every tree she can get. If she were in a tree, she'd know it. She'd climb back down."

"Yeah, but would she say it?" Gerhardt argued.

"Easiest way to find out." Brown switched channels on his comm. link. "Put me through to Little Dolly," he requested. "Honey, it's Daddy."

"Daddy? Are you coming to get me?"

"I am," Brown promised fiercely, rubbing at his eye when a stray dust mote flew in—and stuck. Had to have been dirt. Nothing else would account for the sudden watering that occurred. "Honey," he repeated, trying not to use her name. No use in giving away any possible advantage to an enemy that might be listening in. "Honey, tell Daddy: did Uncle take you up a tree?"

"N—no," she told him, thinking hard.

"Are you still in the woods? Did you go on a car ride?"

"I'm in the woods, Daddy, and it's dark and I'm cold…" Trying to be brave.

Brown's heart broke, and his teammates could see the pieces fall apart.

Blane stepped in. "We're coming to get you, little one," he promised. "You keep talking to your mother. Tell her everything you can about where you are. Keep trying to wake up Uncle." _I won't suggest that you're trying to wake the dead, not that you'd understand what that meant. Not at your age._

"O—okay."

Gerhardt kept thinking. "Even a thicket of bushes wouldn't be enough to keep out the light. The only place that Betty Blue could have taken her without light, if not a hole inside a tree trunk, would be underground."

"You're talking caves?" Williams asked. "There aren't any caves in this field. It's forest, with an open field to one side."

"Yeah." Gerhardt lapsed into silence, but only for a moment. "Gimme the map."

"You have a thought?" Blane handed over the large square of paper.

"I do." Gerhardt gave one corner of the map to Williams, to spread it out. "They gave us a line to follow from the comm. signal, and it runs along here."

Brown refused to let the sudden hope spring into his voice. Dirt Diver was damn good, but would he be good enough? Brown refused to promise himself that everything would turn out all right. That wouldn't happen, he knew, until he could actually lay eyes on his daughter. Anything less would be too painful to endure. "The comm. signal line passes through forest, mostly, and then into the field."

"Right. Your daughter, Brown, was playing right here. This was where we had the picnic two weeks ago, and where she went to play yesterday before all hell broke loose." Gerhardt pointed to a spot along the edge of the forested area, nearest to the base. "Now, there has to be a reason that Betty Blue went into the forest rather than make a run for the base."

Williams frowned. "We already decided that. They were shooting at him. He needed cover."

"Right. But what if there was another reason?"

"Another reason?" Blane echoed. "Explain."

"More than a year ago, Betty Blue and I took a group on a training mission in here," Gerhardt said. "Betty Blue, along with the flag, went missing for a good couple of hours. Drove me nuts. Couldn't find him. He finally pops up after I give up and just wait him out," he added.

Blane had to ask. "You win?"

"Yup. No glory in a defensive position. I couldn't find him, but he didn't take my flag," Gerhardt added. "Point is, Betty Blue has a hiding place that he knows and I don't. Yet," he told them grimly.

Brown wasn't satisfied. "Point is, he can hide from you." _With my daughter._

"He's underground, my son," Gerhardt said. "Now, look at this map. There ain't many spots where Betty Blue or anyone else can go underground. You have to have a place with plenty of hard rock, or your little hole in the ground falls in during the next good rain. Most of this is forest with soft dirt to grow in or field that's flat enough not to stop a bullet. Every place except here." He pointed.

"The creek?"

"Best place I can think of. Rocks. Boulders."

Blane nodded. "If they're inside a cave, this is where it would be. And the line from the signal crosses it…here." His finger briefly touched the map, like a talisman. He came to a decision. "Move out. Double time."

* * *

The brook babbled, and the sun did its best to warm the water that trickled along the creek bed through trees with enough leaves to darken every spot along its banks. Under other circumstances Brown would have stopped for a moment to enjoy the beauty, to inhale the scent of fresh air and life.

Not at the moment. There were more important things on his mind.

"Spread out," Blane ordered grimly. "Take your time; don't overlook any clue. They're here." His comm. unit buzzed at him. "Snake Doc."

"Home base. Snake Doc, the triangulation points are in. Betty Blue is located in sector D, four."

"Thank you, sir. We are already here."

"Nice to know we guessed right," Gerhardt said, the sarcasm heavy. "Don't suppose they can give us an altitude?"

"I don't see any caves," Williams put in, doubt in his voice. "Lots of boulders. There's a cliff on this side of the creek. It must have worn down the bank, a few hundred years ago."

"Or a few thousand," Gerhardt mused, running his hand over the rock face. It was smooth, rubbed clean by the creek as it rose and fell.

"There has to be an opening somewhere in here." Brown pulled away a bush, looking for a dark spot that would signal the entrance to a cave.

"Down here," Williams called out, voice grim. "Got a body. Neck's broken; few bones, too."

Gerhardt joined him. "Looks like he fell over the cliff. Fool got too close, lost his balance. One less idiot in the world. I'll flag him for later pick up. Maybe we can identify him, get fingerprints or something." _Not that I really care, but we might get some valuable data from this corpse._

Blane went for the high ground, on top of the cliff, for a bird's eye view, keeping to the main objective. He scanned the terrain. "I see no other place that fits our target area," he mused. He let his eyes go unfocused, taking in the scenery, inhaling everything in his path and taking a long moment before digesting the information.

There was a newly disturbed area, where the grass had fallen in on top of the cliff. Recent, too; the dirt was still black, not lightened from exposure to sunlight. It was fresh. Fresh meant—

"Up here," Blane ordered harshly.

"Top?" Brown was instantly there, climbing the cliff to the top of the grassy plateau, the hope that he couldn't control flooding him with tension.

Blane, beside him, pointed. "Right there. Ground has fallen in. Cave in, and it's recent."

Brown went flat onto the ground, laying his ear onto the dirt. "Serena?"

"Daddy?"

They all heard that: it wasn't through the comm. link. It had seeped out through the cracks in the rock into the open air and it was _music._ Blane toggled his comm. "Snake Doc to Home Base. Inform Mama Breeze that we located Little Dolly, and rescue is commencing."

"You need back up, Snake Doc?"

"Equipment would be nice. Some strong backs." Blane doubted that the shovels would actually be needed. The speed Cool Breeze was making, he'd have his daughter out ricki-tick before anyone could fetch so much as a garden spade.

"You got it, Snake Doc. Home Base, out."

"This boulder is in the way," Brown said, having dug out all the fresh dirt that he could. His hands were already filthy, and a scrape showed a fresh smear of blood. "It's too heavy."

Gerhardt was reading the signs from the brush around them. "Somebody walked around up here, looking for Betty Blue. Boulder split in two, probably under the weight of our friend with the broken neck. Look at the sharp edges to this thing. That's real recent." _And the reason that Betty Blue was no longer talking;_ Blane could hear that unspoken part of Gerhardt's discussion. The world caved in on Betty Blue and Little Dolly.

"How are we going to lift it—"

Blane already had the answer to Brown's despairing question. "Ropes. We'll secure some lines around one side of the thing, and see if those muscles the Army has put into us are any good."

Williams suggested an improvement to Blane's plan. "We can use those trees there as a fulcrum, to increase our pulling power."

Gerhardt snorted, acknowledging the good idea. "You a college boy, talkin' about fulcrums?"

"No, sir. Just a man who doesn't want to work hard."

Gerhardt snorted, and looped his end of the rope around the boulder. "Then I want you tugging next to me, Hammerhead. I'll take smarts over brawn any day."

Blane flexed huge biceps. "We'll see. We'll see."

The rock, they would estimate later, was more than two tons of granite. Only years of wear had left a crack through the center of the stone that had encouraged the final break to fill in the small cave that Betty Blue had discovered. Only bad luck had let the crack occur at the exact instant that Betty Blue and Little Dolly were inside. Only good luck had kept them from being crushed in a bloody instant.

Tricky work. The Unit soldiers hauled at the boulder, heaving in tandem until the boulder moved back and out of the way. They tied off the ropes just enough to expose a dirty body, one that wasn't moving. Trying to move the boulder further, they realized, would likely cause it to slide back into the tiny cave below and finish the job it had started. No, digging out more dirt around the far edge of the cave-turned-hole in the ground was safer, and one that Blane ordered his men to do.

Charlie Grey came out first. The story wasn't hard to read: he had had only an instant of time to react, one split second of warning during the crack of the boulder to throw himself between it and the young girl in his charge. There had been a price: the Unit soldier was out cold, blood congealed on the back of his head, and Blane's probing fingers told him that it was serious. There was a curious softness underneath the dirty scalp that told of damage. It took another few moments to dig underneath the legs that had been pinned, and they lifted him out.

"Bro?" Williams couldn't help but feel for a pulse. It was there, slow. Too slow.

But pulling the man out had exposed someone equally as precious: Serena Brown. One long grab, and she was in her father's arms, never to leave them again. She sobbed against his neck, and Bob Brown clutched her tight. "Cool Breeze to Home Base. Let Mama Breeze know that Little Dolly is all right."

The return sob through the comm. link told him that the message had gotten through.

Gerhardt already had more rope out of his kit, fashioning together a rude stretcher. "Let's not take our time with family reunions," was his dour comment. "Where the hell's the locket?"

Blane felt in Grey's pockets, first the one in his jacket and then in his pants. Something hard touched his fingers, and he drew it out.

The gold of the locket twinkled in the sunlight, untouched by any of the surrounding dirt. Somehow none of the dust had managed to enter the locket's temporary home in Grey's pants, and at the moment it didn't matter. Blane looked down at the smallest member of his team. Smallest in stature, but not smallest in heart.

They had paid a heavy price for this intel. Blane sincerely hoped that it was worth it.


End file.
